


too pure for you or anyone

by consumptive_sphinx



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, Homesickness, Self-Worth Issues, purity culture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-25
Updated: 2017-10-25
Packaged: 2019-01-23 02:12:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12496204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/consumptive_sphinx/pseuds/consumptive_sphinx
Summary: When Maeglin enters Gondolin, he is covered in grime from the road, the only unclean thing in a perfectly clean city.





	too pure for you or anyone

When Maeglin first sees Gondolin, he is still not accustomed to the light, and everything seems to gleam purest white.

* * *

When Maeglin enters Gondolin, he is covered in grime from the road, the only unclean thing in a perfectly clean city.

Aredhel walks ahead of him: she's no less dirty than he is, but she walks like she belongs here, like she could wash and then be just as clean as Gondolin, like Nan Elmoth is a layer over her skin rather than soaked so deeply into it she would need to tear away her flesh to get it out.

In Gondolin they wear bright colors, deep red and royal blue and rich yellow and vibrant purple and crisp white. Aredhel used to wear white, and she would glow in the torchlight. Maeglin has worn black and grey and brown and forest green all his life, and what helped him blend into Nan Elmoth sticks out like a stain on a white dress here in Gondolin.

King Turgon wears sky blue robes, and he smells like a library. Maeglin shies away from him — those pale blue robes would show dirt nearly as badly as Aredhel’s dresses. Turgon doesn't seem to mind. The King’s family embraces Aredhel, edges away from Maeglin like he is a lump of something they don't want to touch, and Maeglin does not touch anything, does not stain anything, does not get his filth on anything. He knows he is not wanted here.

* * *

And then Aredhel is dead, and Eöl executed, and Maeglin is alone.

* * *

They look at Maeglin suspiciously at first — not Turgon, not Idril, they are both so very kind, but the others of Gondolin look at Maeglin as if at any moment his features might twist into Eöl’s.

Maeglin keeps his head down. He stays inside and away from the sunlight — it burns his skin, burns his eyes — and does not correct people on his name; if they choose to use his mothername he will let them call him Lómion. He is the son of Aredhel here; the son of Eöl would not be welcome. He sets himself to learning fluent rather than broken Quenya, to learning how to read, to learning the customs of this new place.

Turgon — Turukáno, he should use the King’s chosen name — visits him in the rooms that once belonged to Aredhel. It takes nearly a month before Maeglin learns to stop expecting the King to sentence him to execution along with his father.

Turgon never touches him, is always hesitant to get too close. Turgon — Turukáno — calls it concern for Maeglin, and he is very kind for lying, but Maeglin knows better, knows that he is untouchable, dirty. He does not pursue the topic; if Turgon — _Turukáno_ — does not wish to speak of it, Maeglin will not force him. He is here on the King’s good graces, after all. And he does not wish to fall.

* * *

Itarillë is beautiful, clean. She wears white and dances barefoot and walks her streets as the Princess of the city and seems untouched by dust. At first Maeglin watches her in the hope of learning how to move in Gondolin, and then he watches her because she is beautiful.

Itarillë does not approach him, does not speak to him, does not spend time with him. Maeglin wishes she would — she is so very beautiful — and is glad that she does not — she is so pure, so clean, and he has no wish to touch her with his filth. He would only stain her.

 _It would be worth it to have her,_ he thinks, and buries the thought deep in his mind where he will not find it again. It would not be.

* * *

Time passes. The city gleams in the daylight and glows in the night. They call him the Lord of the Mole, a burrowing thing that roots around in the dirt, and Maeglin pretends not to notice the insult. They are not _wrong,_ after all.

Sometimes at night he curls up in the darkness beneath his bed rather than on top of it, sleeps there with the curtains drawn and the smell of wood and pretends he is in Nan Elmoth. It should not be comforting — Maeglin is so very lucky to have made it to Gondolin — but he does sleep better those nights.

* * *

Tuor is no more clean than Maeglin, and for the first few days Maeglin thinks that perhaps they could build a friendship on that base — the two unclean people in this pristine, gleaming city.

But Tuor doesn't seem to even notice how unclean he is: he holds onto fabric with his entire hand and not only his fingertips, brushes against walls without a second thought, hugs people with no regard that he is soiling them. They do not seem to mind that he does. Maeglin does not go near him, does not watch him; he needs no instruction on how to behave as Tuor does.

He marries Itarillë. Maeglin loathes him, then. He does not deserve Itarillë either, but at least Maeglin does not _stain_ her.

* * *

And then — and then —

* * *

They put Maeglin back exactly as he was. There are no scars except the ones he had before, no tattoos except the ones his father gave him. Sometimes Maeglin is unsure whether it happened at all; the only evidence he has is his memories, but Angband was dark and filthy and Maeglin can feel how it sunk into his skin. No matter how violently he scrubs at his arms, he cannot get it out.

 _Gondolin is no longer safe,_ he tries to say, and the words will not come out of his throat; _they can rip the memories from your mind,_ he tries to say, and he cannot speak.

Gondolin is no longer safe, and it is Maeglin’s fault.

* * *

Maeglin dies the same way his father died, a spine-shattering drop onto sharp rocks, and he does looking up into the sun, looking up into purest white light.


End file.
